Snippets and Snapshots
by Alaena Night
Summary: Trigun oneshots and drabbles. Animeverse, mangaverse, dark, lighthearted, some romance, action, lots of drama...scattered fragments from an overactive mind. Enter if you dare. [11:] ”Don't cry,” he says...but I hear him at night. [VxM]
1. Precipice

**Precipice**

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Trigun, the characters, the episodes, the plotline, or the planet. That covers everything, and applies to each individual story that follows this, just in case I accidentally forget to pen the usual 'I don't own anything' disclaimer. Hopefully there will be some more soon! Just as a quick note: this is a scene in between the anime episodes Alternative and Paradise.

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The cliff seemed to drop off the face of the earth into a pit blacker than death, where the only visible features were upright rocks contrasted by the blue-silver glow of the moons.

Vash sat down on the precipice, letting his feet dangle over, sighing as they were gently manipulated by what was left of the violent winds that plagued the valley far, far below. To anyone standing up here, it looked so peaceful, but what they wouldn't see was that the seemingly calm haze at the bottom was a near-constant sandstorm. Beneath the surface of such a bleak landscape, turmoil tore that beautiful valley apart.

A soft expulsion of breath caught his attention, and Vash's head jerked around, right hand settling on his gun.

He relaxed when he recognized the casually standing silhouette. "Wolfwood," he murmured, seeing the following puff of smoke as ash fell to the ground.

"Yup."

"Wolfwood...why—?"

"—_Don't._ Shut up, Needlenoggin. I did what I had to today."

Shaking his head, the black-clad priest sat down by the edge, taking a deep breath of smoke and blowing it out in a stream that lingered over the precipice and then was torn by the currents of wind. "Amazing, huh?"

Vash didn't answer. He opened his mouth, but then he closed it again, painting a smile over his face with a huge amount of effort. His eyes stayed on the windy valley. "Maybe...dangerous," he finally replied.

Wolfwood shook his head, leaning back and dropping the cigarette onto the ground, crushing its yellow embers with a rock. He sighed, shaking his head. "Ya always gotta crash the party, huh? Try lightening up."

Vash offered a sheepish smile that turned ironic. "Like you?"

Wolfwood smirked. "Surely there are better role models around."

Vash continued to stare out into the darkness. "You know...you don't have to...to kill. Anyone can change."

"I do what I think is right, Needlenoggin. No time to think about it. Hesitation is worse than anything. That kid today..." Wolfwood drew a very deep drag on his cigarette and turned away, trailing off, his voice stolen by the whistle of the wind.

Vash let out a slow breath.

Wolfwood surprised Vash with a friendly punch to his shoulder. "You're getting all brooding again. Don't. I do what I do because that's what I must do at this point in time. Soon I'll have the time to think. For now, I live by what I've been taught. We can't all throw our lives carelessly onto the table like you do, ya idiot. Soon... soon I'll have the time to rest and do other things. Not now, though."

"Wolfwood..."

But he waved as he turned around, dropping yet another spent cigarette to the dirt. "See ya around. Don't go and get yourself killed."

Vash nodded. "Same to you, preacher man."

The dark form shook with dry laughter. "Who me? Now why would I do something stupid like that?"

Vash sighed as Wolfwood disappeared in the distance. He should probably go in, too.

They'd all need to be alert for their journey to Tonim tomorrow.

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**Author's Notes: **How did I do? Reviews and/or constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated. I hope to be able to add more little one shots and some drabbles later on. Thanks for reading! Questions, comments? Tomatoes?


	2. Monster

**Monster **

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They call me insane; I call them illogical. They call me merciless; I call them clueless. They call me a monster, but I have yet to show them what a monster really is. My weapons in this feat would be simple: a mirror.

If only such a tainted humanity could see their actions as if in a mirror. If only they would realize, like I have, how disgusting and ultimately doomed they really are.

They say I am a murderer, but I only shed tainted blood, while they sap the innocent life from those who have committed no crimes. Who is the worse of us, truly?

It is them.

Irrational, contradictory, animalistic...

They call me a nightmare, but I bring them innocence in death. I bring them silent dreams. The humans know nothing. They see nothing other than what they want to believe. That is why they must die. Perfection cannot exist when marred by these tumors called humans. It is ironic that the word "human" is associated with compassion and care. If you were to ask one of those spiders why they impulsively gave a gift of kindness, they would reply that it is because they are human.

The phrase in itself is a contradiction. It makes me laugh.

"Does it hurt, spider?"

A soft gasp of air, a muffled sob and the drop of pleading tears on the floor. "Please...Please don't kill me."

The light of reflecting flames plays over the tears in her eyes, and I look upon the spider. My dear brother calls her Meryl. Her black hair is symbolic of the taint of her race, and her eyes... I wonder if they look like the amethyst Rem told us about. One day I'll find out, because I will have cleaned the world of the pathetic species called humanity. "No. I think I will kill you."

I manipulate the blades I bind her with. One is jammed into the wall under her suspended feet, with several others binding bunches of her clothing to the wall. A blade hovers by her neck, independent of my body but bound to my will.

Instead of slicing her neck, I make the blade rise. I mentally alter its texture, and through my will, the lights in the room grow brighter.

"Look," I demand, as her tear-stained face reflects in the blade. "Tell me what you see."

Her voice shakes as tears roll down her face. "I see...I see me."

"Hopeless."

In anger, I move the blade and swipe it across her throat in one quick movement.

Disgusting. If only there was a less messy way to do this.

There were once many bodies here. None of them had seen a monster when they looked into my mirror. They only saw themselves.

My eyes wander to the corner of the room, and I whisper a silent apology. I have plans that I will put into effect soon, and so I would rather not use my own energy to dispose of these insects. I desired to save my powers for something on a much larger scale. My conclusion to this problem was simple. I'd use Vash's. His powers really are almost limitless, so it doesn't matter. He couldn't stand watching what I did, imprisoned, unable to help, so I gave him rest, and all I took in return was his assistance. Fortunately, his mind led me to those parasites he'd stayed with for so long. Millie. Meryl.

Those two had only seen_ themselves_ in the mirror. Now they were gone. I look over to my brother, strapped to a table in the darkest corner of the room. "Soon, things will be different. It will just be the two of us. You'll see."

I lean down and pick up the blade, moving my fingers over the polished surface. I lift it just far enough to see the reflection of my pursed mouth, but then I drop it again.

It isn't that I don't want to look into the mirror. I just don't have time for such useless games.

I am what I am.

A thought creeps into my mind, and I push it away. Probably Vash's thoughts again, breaking into my conscious mind.

Even though supressed, the thought remains.

_I am what I am...but what am I?

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**Author's Notes: **Okay, just another random oneshot, this one told from Knives' first person perspective, in a sort of stream of consciousness way. I guess it's sort of wacky and definitely not what I hope happens in the series, but I couldn't help it. Hope it makes a bit of sense. I love reviews and hug them and call them George. Criticism is always welcome. Thanks for reading!


	3. My Candle

**My Candle**

**Notes/Disclaimer: **_Me no own Trigun. You own Trigun? Anyway, this is just a quick story, sorta kinda (maybe) AUish, hugely mangaverse, sort of...confusing... Hope you like! I promise I'll do something lighthearted soon, really... I'm just...gah! I'm **really** not as depressed as all these sad little stories make me out to be, honest..._

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He glanced up at the sky as soft droplets of rain sprinkled across his upturned face. The soft sprinkle soon became a pour, and he relished the feeling of the cool water, letting it drip from the tree he sat against and through the cloth of his rough cloak to the now darkened strands of his hair. The cold droplets lingered on his eyelashes and rolled down his nose. He tried to smile but could only summon a wistful ghost of one.

Only a few decades ago, rain had been something spoken of in awed whispers. It came so rarely that a person could go a lifetime without seeing it. The clouds spread across the sky in a rumbling, black promise of rain, and he only thought it suitable that the sky should weep on this day.

A wind stole the rain from its downward pour and snatched it sideways, driving the drops into the ground diagonally. Bits of sand and dirt were tossed up by the harsh battering, but still he sat, taking the beating of the rain with his eyes closed, because if he sheltered himself, his tears wouldn't be hidden by the rain anymore.

He wished she could see it, the beauty of green life strewn in scraggly patches across the arid planet, the growth of the small miracles from little sprouts to full-grown bushes, from twigs to trees.

The ships from Earth had arrived to take their fellow humans home, but in the end, many of the peoples of Gunsmoke had decided that they'd been through far too much to just leave their home behind. The technology from Earth had done a great deal in beginning the new life on this planet, but to say that they had done it all would have been a lie. It was the people living here who had kept it going even when it seemed like everything would fall.

And she had been the strongest of them all.

But, like so many others, she was gone.

The rain slowed down, but his tears kept coming.

The beginning of life on this planet...he'd seen it. He'd seen death and utter despair. He'd seen the loss of life and the loss of hope, and then he'd seen both born anew. One day, he was sure, many decades or even centuries from now, that new life would dwindle and die. Darkness would come again, and he'd live through that, too. It was the worst curse to know the beginning and anticipate the end, to live a life where other lives flashed by too quickly and he still stood, watching it all happen, humanity's chaperone.

There had been a time when these thoughts were far from his mind, when he had lived each day without looking forward or back, but those days had died with her.

If she was here, she'd be giving him a good, stern talking to about getting all depressed and then she'd look up at him from her diminutive height with an expression much taller than she was, so he felt like he was cowering beneath a storm, and she'd tell him to get off his butt and keep going.

He smiled and stood, holding out a hand so that the rain falling from the sky built up in his cupped fingers. He turned and looked at the small stone behind him, the marker that rested in between the roots of one of the first trees that had been planted. He loosened his fingers and let the water drip onto the stone and slip through the words etched into it.

_Meryl Stryfe, _the stone read.

_My candle._

The simple inscription had been added with care, each letter carved agonizingly into the stone.

Like a candle, her life had burned so brightly, yet so briefly, in his heart. But no wick burned forever, and before he could grasp the light he had found, it had faded away. All he could do was watch as the world ran past him, while he stood in an eternal standstill, unable to touch, unable to truly live but at the same time incapable of death, remembering the flickering warmth of lives that had been left behind him.

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**Author's Notes:** _Yikes!_** Depressing...** _Sorry about that. I just got to thinking about how sad it would be to watch the world pass by, and I felt really sorry for Vash, got all rambly...and this is what came of it. Anyway, reviews will be loved to death, read, reread and treasured. Please leave your thoughts. This was written sort of impulsively and too late at night to be rational, and I'm hoping it's comprehensible. (bites lip)_


	4. Oops?

**Oops**

**WARNING: **Well, I promised something lighthearted. I just...didn't think I'd end up writing absolute idiocy. This is **extremely** random. Please consult your doctor before reading. Side effects may include drooling, dizziness, blurred vision, and nausea. If you have an aversion to silliness, please do not read, as doing so may result in coma, brain damage, or even death. Consider yourself warned...

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"Lay it right down there! That's right! Good, you sneaky bastard. Now walk. Walk away! Get outta here!"

Vash retreated back to the weak wooden crate he'd hidden himself behind, grinning weakly and wiping sweat from his face as the group of thugs walked forward, satisfaction etched into their wrinkly, leathered faces.

"Hey, Spikey." Wolfwood looked up dryly from behind the crate, chewing absently on a cigarette. "Don't you think we should _run _now?"

"Oh!" Vash nodded fervently. "Yep." They both got up and made a run for it from behind the stack of empty crates and cartons. Vash noticed that Wolfwood was particularly eager to get out of there, though he didn't know why. He sighed as he ran. Today had sure been _awful _busy. He'd promised the girls he wouldn't get into trouble, but he'd really won that game of poker fair and square, and then those messy men had been _so insistent _on getting their money back, but...

Vash had already lost it.

He didn't remember how.

Oh yeah! He'd given it to the old man asking for money. After all, what could the Humanoid Typhoon do with all that cash? Much too heavy to carry around. Though he had berated himself for not keeping just a little to buy doughnuts with...

Vash tripped and Wolfwood pulled him along until he got to his feet again. _Huh? _Oh yes. He was running for his life now. But...those men? Were they...chasing? No. They couldn't be. Of course they couldn't. He'd given them what they wanted, though he'd found it kind of funny that they'd wanted so little.

Or perhaps he was just biased because the bounty on his head was enough to fund the creation of a major city.

It ended up that the leader of the thugs had bet his watch, and he wanted _that _back. So Vash had calmly retrieved the old man and asked kindly to see the winnings so that he could get the watch. The man had shoved him out, and Wolfwood said dryly that he'd handle it. Wolfwood had walked inside without a moment of hesitation, closing the door smoothly behind him.

Vash had heard a very loud crash and hissing voices, and after that, for some reason, the man had been very nice to them. They'd gotten the watch and the two hundred double-dollars—the thugs had asked for those, too—and they'd left. Those men had said that they'd lost those two hundred double dollars in the game, but Vash thought it had been just a hundred or so between all of them.

Oh well. He had a horrible memory.

He'd packed the items in a little cardboard box and set out to return them to the men.

And now?

"Why are they _chasing_, Wolfwood?"

The traveling priest gave a rather hesitant shrug and growled, "Concentrate on the running part, okay?"

Vash nodded. The two turned a corner and waited until their pursuers passed, and then they returned to the little hotel room he and the girls were staying at.

Millie walked out to greet them, waving enthusiastically and smiling. "Hey Mr. Vash, Mr. Priest Man! You look like you've been running! Were you playing a game?"

Vash didn't listen. The only thing he saw was the pretty watch on her wrist.

A men's watch.

His jaw dropped.

Wolfwood...not so much.

"Wha..._Insurance Girl?_ You stole the watch?"

Millie blinked at him innocently. "Stole? I was just looking for a box of my pudding, and when I opened it up I found this! I was sad I couldn't find my pudding—have you seen it?—but I was happy when I found this. It's very pretty."

"But..." Vash turned to the priest and narrowed his gaze. "You! You gave them Big Girl's pudding! That's why they were chasing us!"

Wolfwood grinned innocently around the cigarette. "Who, me?"

Vash _glared._

"Yeah, well, you've been running around not eating anything but doughnuts and you wanna know what? We're starving! And the money could get us food. Besides, I need a new watch."

Vash sagged as distant cries strained to them.

"...Gonna kill 'em!...Pudding? Those damn scoundrels—!"

Wolfwood shrugged, offering the big Insurance Girl a guilty grin. "Oops?"

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**Author's Notes: **Sorry for the updates spaced so close together. I'll be gone over the weekend and I thought I'd rather post this now than never. Just a bit of random idiocy. Sorry if it's too unbearably stupid. But I promised something more lighthearted, and this just sort of tumbled out of my brain, soo... Review? Reviewing makes all those nasty side effects go away, I promise. ... I should stick to drama


	5. I Walk Alone

**I Walk Alone**

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_I walk a lonely road  
The only one that I have ever known  
Don't know where it goes  
But it's home to me and I walk alone_

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"Vash, you idiot! Wait!" Meryl ran to the door as he walked out of their lives again. Millie slept noisily on the couch beside the door, even though the worn piece of furniture was much too small for her. Lanky arms and legs stuck out all over. Meryl didn't see, though, and she didn't hear. She just watched as he walked away. Again.

Sometimes she loved him and sometimes she just wanted to slap him. Sometimes it was both, like right now.

How could he have been here for as long as he'd been here and not realize that he couldn't always shoulder every bit of the responsibility? He'd come here out of need for help. It didn't matter if he'd brought Knives with him. Meryl had seen his eyes as he walked out. They seemed so blank and empty, as if he had run before and would run again, as far away as he needed to, to get away from those who cared for him most.

Now he was leaving again, taking his brother with him, determined not to cause Meryl and Millie any pain by his brother.

She wondered if he knew that she didn't _care._

He thought he had to protect anyone, and in doing so, he tore his own heart apart.

In that moment, Meryl felt that she'd rather brave any pain than see him leave alone.

She couldn't say it, though. She could only watch, not speak.

He thought he was saving her but it hurt worse than death to watch him go.

Both suns were nearly gone over the horizon, and half the sky glinted with stars and three visible moons, while the other half desperately fought to keep the remainder of day. Dark streaks of cobalt cloud encroached on the orange and indigo sky beyond the night, stealing the light away. Vash was cast in fiery light as he walked away, his shadow fading more and more as he slipped into the darkness around him.

"Vash!" Meryl stepped away from the door, onto the sand, and started after him. "Don't you dare...don't leave! It's..." Oh God, what could she say? She'd say anything, anything at all, to make him stay. Anything but the thing she most needed to say, that was. "It's—my job..." she caught herself on a sob as she realized how utterly weak that stupid excuse was. She forced the tears away and stood up straight.

"You'll get another job," Vash said. "Don't worry about me." He turned to smile at her, but even though his mouth did all the right things, his eyes seemed so distant from it all that she just wanted to cry. There was a deep and tender emptiness inside of them, and when her own eyes met with them, she could feel it as if it was her own.

"Don't go," she said.

He stopped, for the briefest moment, lingering on the edge of complete darkness. "Meryl...Please. Don't follow me. I have to do this alone. I don't..." He had dropped all pretense of goofiness. He searched her eyes. "I don't want you to come with me. I don't want you to have to go through any of this. I couldn't let you." He grinned brightly to defuse his words. "Okay?"

"But..."

_Why? Why was it that whenever she wanted to say something, her words ran together and her blood rushed to her cheeks? Why was it that she could yell and scream and say everything but the words she really wanted to say?_

"Why, Vash?"

He stepped farther into the darkness, so that his face was almost completely obscured by it. "'Cause," he said. Even in the dark she could tell that his stupid hand was back behind his head running nervously through his hair, as if he thought she'd think him silly. "It's what I've always done. I don't know any other way I could do it."

Meryl slumped against the wall of the tiny house and sat herself down on the sand, where the darkness was making its way toward her. _Damn it, damn it, damn it! _He was walking away.

_Stop him._

"Vash..."

Or if not stop him, at least...

"I want to go with you, Vash."

She swore she could see his eyes, and she swore they were filled with tears, but it could have just been a trick of the light. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm sorry, Meryl, I can't let you. Maybe...one day. Maybe we'll meet in Eden."

He disappeared into the dark, and it seemed to sweep too quickly over the land, engulfing the sun's rays in empty artificial light. Her tears glinted from the moon's illumination as they rolled down her cheeks and onto her hands. She hated him for being so stupid, for taking the world's cares onto worn shoulders that had hefted too many burdens. She hated herself for letting him, and for not running after him, for being scared of dying.

_Just come back. Come back to me one day, and you'd better come back alive..._

"I'll be waiting."

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_My shadow's the only one that walks beside me  
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating  
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me  
'Til then I walk alone..._

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**Author's Notes: **The lyrics quoted at the beginning and end are Green Day's Boulevard of Broken Dreams. It fits really well with poor Vash, I think. Reviews are **very** much appreciated, and constructive criticism is my best friend. (A best friend that beat me up and threw me in the way of a semi truck as a kid, but still, it's my best friend.) Kidding. Don't hesitate to call me on any errors!

::gently offers the purple button::


	6. To Continue On

**Courage to Continue**

_The scars you experience on your journey will be the unforgettable memories of your life._ **- Millie Thompson**

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No matter where I go, the marks of my past walk beside me, inevitably connected to me. My scars, the evidence of my failure to protect. This hair, blacker than the deaths I've caused...a reminder of what I am and what I have become. Knives says we're superior. He says we have some kind of one-up on the human race.

He doesn't know how much he's kidding himself. We're so flawed.

_I_ am flawed.

The water, blindingly hot, sprays down on me, washing my memories back down into the tumultuous oblivion of my mind. I suppose I'd better get out of here before the insurance girls break in thinking I'm dead or something. I don't know how long I've been in here.

I twist the squeaky faucet off and the shower's spray slowly dies. The room's mirror is fogged up completely, and I'm grateful I can't see into it as I step out of the tub. I'm sure everyone must think I'm crazy for taking hot showers on such an arid planet. Let them think what they will. I can't see to put my hair up, so I quickly rub it dry and let it stay wherever it falls.

I breathe a labored breath into the muggy air. Too hot in here. Quickly donning a pair of jeans and a button-up shirt that I don't bother to button—it'd take too much time—I step out. The steam from the room sifts from the open door. Compared to the air in there, it seems nice in the room, even though the temperature is dangerously high as always.

"Vash, when the heck're you gonna get out of—"

I stop abruptly halfway to the living room, and many words that Rem did _not_ teach me come tumbling out of my mouth in a low whisper.

Can anyone say deja vu?

I turn around rather quickly, but I know she saw. Counting ever so slowly to three, I pull a smile from God only knows where and turn around, willing my guest to meet my eyes. Anything that keeps her eyes away from...those. She follows my lead. Her cheeks are a bright red, both slender hands twittering nervously at her sides.

"I...I didn't mean to," she mutters uselessly, her eyes dropping away from mine. She quickly gathers her composure. "Millie and I are ready to go right now! What's keeping you?" Those twittering hands stiffen and perch at her sides, the softened eyes become hard, and the small mouth forms into a deadly frown.

"Ah...Hey, Insurance Girl, don'tcha go getting all mad, okay? I lost track of time..." I rub a hand absently through my messy, soggy hair and shuffle on the floor.

This is the dance we do, the motions without heart that we always make.

This facade...I can't bother holding it up now. The hand drops and my saccharine smile melts off of my face, replaced by a softer one that isn't as hard to summon. "You want something to drink, Insurance Girl?"

Her title...another formality, but it comes natural to me, like so many other things; just another method of keeping people at a distance.

Perhaps I shouldn't think about those things too much, shouldn't analyze every little thing. But there's far too much time to waste it _all _drunk or eating doughnuts. Meryl follows me into the kitchen of the little hotel room, and I can tell she's uncomfortable. Beer probably wouldn't go over well with her—after all, she prides herself on being responsible—so I find a couple clean cups, some a_lmost _clean water—because clean water doesn't exist here—and a couple of ice cubes. I hold out a cup to her. "Sorry there's nothing much. It's probably better for you to drink water with the temperature outside, anyway."

Meryl takes the glass and sips at it. She doesn't make those slurpy sounds, which I find cool because even after all this time it's hard not to make slurpy sounds when taking such small sips. I find myself watching her. Maybe I should devote more of my time to things like not making slurpy sounds instead of psychoanalyzing people.

She lifts the glass away from her lips, unaware of my scrutiny, and looks through the clear liquid to the window opposite her. I desperately keep in a laugh, because her already large violet eyes look huge when magnified by the water and the curve of the glass.

She puts it down and I pull my eyes away just in time.

"I don't know why you're so self-conscious about them," she says softly.

It takes me a split second to realize what she means. "Heh, yeah!" I laugh loudly and wonder if she knows there's no real enthusiasm in it.

She looks my way, questioning and critical like she always is, and I'm certain she won't speak anymore. "Vash..."

At least, I thought I was certain.

The eyes she looks at me with are full of compassion, and it hurts more than her barbs.

"Look...it's not really that," I say softly. I guess...she's risking her life to follow me. I owe an explanation to her. "It's not that I'm self-conscious...about how I look." I pull the shirt tight and begin to fasten the buttons. My left arm is being a bit sluggish today, and so I fumble a bit.

Meryl, ever surprising, pulls together a semi-businesslike demeanor and says, "What is it, then?" The professional manner is shattered by the way she plays with her fingers in her lap.

"Every single scar...is...it's—" Wow, now I'm just like her. I've heard about choking on words but I didn't realize it could be literal. My teeth clench of their own will, grinding each word out with uncertainty. "It's my failures. Each one is a person I couldn't save or an action I couldn't complete. They are the reminders of all that I've done wrong. I suppose to hide it is a flaw in itself, but..." I smile softly in her direction.

Meryl's cheeks are so red I could swear all her blood has congregated there. "Ah," she murmurs. "I guess...I understand. But..."

Defying the humanly possible, her blush deepens. "But it's not a shame, I don't think. It's not bad...failing, I mean. I've heard something. It's...um...a quote. An Earth quote. The quote's originator has been lost through the years, but it's still beautiful. Have you heard it?" She paused, and when she continued, her voice was barely audible. "Success is not final. Failure...is not fatal." She dared to look up for the fraction of a second, and finished. "It is the courage to continue that counts." Meryl smiled. "You have a lot of that. The courage to continue."

I open my mouth to speak. "It's a nice quote," I finally say.

Meryl nods. "We studied little bits of ancient Earth history in school a long time ago. It's funny that I actually remembered it. I didn't much like history."

She stands and walks to the door. "Anyway, hurry your butt up. The 'Steamer isn't going to be here forever, and we most certainly aren't going to waste Bernardelli's funds!"

She opens the door and starts through it, but I lift my hand. "Meryl..."

Her professional demeanor had returned, leaving barely a trace of the soft, maternal side she so effectively pushes down.

"Thank you."

"It's no problem." She smiles. She seems ready to say, _It's my job, _but stops. Waving, she exits.

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**Author's Notes: **_Just a little Trigun oneshot, itsy hint of VxM...lol, I suppose everyone writes stories about this kind of thing, huh? But man, it was hard writing in Vash's first-person POV in the present tense! (hangs soggy brain out to dry) ... Anyway, I didn't credit the quote to its creator because I wasn't sure if very much of Earth history would have actually been preserved, but for the sake of not getting into trouble, the quote was Winston Churchill's. Umm...(sadly points to the little button) Please review? Does this suck?_


	7. Silent Scream

**Silent Scream**

Day 92: Tessla has mastered speech.

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I can't help but wonder, when she was looking at us, staring into our eyes with her own, did she hear our voices? Did she feel the pain? Did she understand what we were doing to her? For three months, she bore everything in silence, her eyes full of agony and sadness and questions she couldn't voice. We all saw it. We saw her face relax into a semi-smile when she was alone and frown when the pain got too bad.

Some days I hate myself.

We ignored it. For our purposes, she was nothing but a specimen. Something new and amazing; a creature born from a man-made object. Because we created them, we mistakenly believed they were ours to play with.

_We had no right._

Two days after the third month of our studies—

No. _God_, I hate that word. It edges around the truth. Studies? No. Experimentation...torture...that's what it was.

She spoke. On day ninety-two, she said her first words.

I wonder if in those first months, she chose not to speak. She must have learned the language from our quiet chatter around her. When she finally opened her mouth, the words that came out were not broken and unsure. They were complete. She understood what she was saying...and what we were doing.

"Please," she said it so softly that at first we could not hear her. A helmet obscured her eyes, yet another device to examine this child who was not a child at all.

"Please," she said again. Her mouth moved only slightly, her voice a ghost of a whisper. "Please stop. It hurts so much."

It caused only a brief pause among us. Some pretended they hadn't heard it at all. Some did not care.

I bit my lip so hard it bled. The only thing that really mattered to them was that in doing so, I distracted myself and lost track of my calculations. It would have to be done all over again. It hurt to watch her bear it. Sometimes she'd touch her restraints or trace the needle tracks in her arms, but other than that, did did almost nothing. She watched with more intelligence than before, more attention.

I swore to myself I'd never look in her eyes after that first time. It felt like drowning. In the blues of her eyes—so pale they bordered on silver, there was so much sorrow. Perhaps it would have been possible to stand if that sorrow had been for herself, but it was too clear in her eyes. She was sorry for us. Silent tears slipped down her cheeks.

Hundreds of days passed, and after the end of each one, when we laid her into the tube in which she rested while we slept, I wished that she'd die. I wished only that she'd find peace from all the things we'd done to her.

But it was not to be. We hit the 200 day mark. Long before that, her body had begun to shut down from our prodding. She no longer healed as she once had. Tumors... she was dying so slowly, as if despite everything, she wanted to hold on, to live. Her body had reached its limit, though, and its decay was stronger than her will.

On the 226th day, I tended to her in her fragile state, and I realized that I had never once seen her smile. I doubted if she was capable of it in her condition. As I finished administering the medication and stood, I felt something dry and warm on my arm. Her hand. The grip was weak, her blue eyes bleary but pleading. "It hurts," she said, even softer than before.

I blinked and tears streaked down my face. Rem and Conrad were right. We should never have let it go this far. We should have listened to them from the beginning.

"Don't worry. It won't hurt for long."

I thought she would die that night, but when I woke up, her fragile heart still beat.

I cried in my quarters all day. I said I felt sick, and none of the others were the wiser. By the end of that day, I had reached a conclusion. The following night, I carried it out.

"Tessla, sweetie. I'm so sorry."

She could barely understand me. I think she caught my words, though.

I held the syringe above the IV port and gently pushed it into the plastic tube. Half was needed to give a temporary release from her pain. I gave her all of it. She watched. She understood this, at the very least, and her eyes were more sorrowful than before.

_"No..."_

She mouthed it. No sound came out. She shook her head.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Tessla. I hope you can forgive us one day. I won't blame you if you don't, though. Just close your eyes. It won't be much longer."

Rem did everything she could to save this girl's life. Nothing had worked. Every protest was ignored. There was one thing I had that Rem didn't. The ability to finally end this girl's pain. Rem believed in life.

I believed in peace from the pain, and that is what I gave Tessla.

Her eyes rolled back and her body shook in convulsions that, though weak, were still too violent for her delicate body. I was only glad that she wasn't conscious to feel them. She stopped shaking, stopped everything.

I killed an angel who had done nothing wrong. Her death was called an accident, and the "project" was formally closed. Some mourned an experiment. Some mourned a child.

We all returned to our peaceful rest and I hated that we couldn't all feel the pain of our failure—of her death—in our cryo-chambers. I was too afraid to speak out, too afraid to stop it...how could I accept thoughtless oblivion inside of that tube? Sometimes I wish the Plants would realize our betrayal and rebel, killing us like we did that sweet little girl.

But that was the worst punishment of all. We lived to fall on that dusty rock, lived to scrape out a living in the blinding heat.

We can all hear her silent screams when we sleep.

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**Author's Notes: **I was reading through the seventh volume of TriMax (kill me, I'm obsessed) and I saw the reports on Tessla's growth. When it said that she'd learned to speak, I couldn't help wondering what she said. The first person viewpoint was just one of the nameless crewmen or women that worked on Tessla. **Please Review? **All reviewers get...um...a lifetime supply of chili cheese dogs! 


	8. One

**One**

**Disclaimer/Notes:** Trigun is not mine. This short drabble-sort-of-thing and all the angstiness therein, however, sadly came from me. Well...I know the PM and Alert systems are down and so I'll be lucky if _anyone_ reads this...but I couldn't help updating in the first few minutes of 2007! (does a happy dance) I hope everyone has a wonderful new year! Thanks so much for taking the time to look at my little story.

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_No._

He had let another one die. Again, he'd failed to protect, and it had cost him more than he could have imagined. Hot red blood slipped through his trembling fingers, down the back of his hands and wrists and beneath the coat that suddenly had no meaning at all.

_No._

His breaths came too fast, his mind in denial even though his body saw the nauseating truth before him. Tears clouded his vision, but before it became impossible to see, they always slipped down, offering him a clear view of what he had not been able to stop.

His failure, his inability...her body.

"No." The word became a mantra as he held her. He pulled her close, nose pressed to her still warm face and baby soft hair, and repeated the word over and over and over again until it became garbled with tears as he rocked back and forth. _No, you can't be gone. No, you can't give up. I was too late to save you. No..._please_...don't go._

He wanted to scream, but his anguish caught in his throat, filling his body with a spreading void.

The longer he held her, the colder she got. "Meryl. No..."

So sudden. They'd felt safe here. _Why was it always him they were after? And why was it never, ever him they ended up hitting?_

She hadn't told them a thing. Those filthy men had asked her again and again where she was staying with Vash the Stampede. Personal business, they said. She hadn't said one word. She hadn't given him up, and it had killed her. Vash had heard the first shot from the little house's kitchen, and he'd felt his heart sieze in his chest with fear. He'd felt cold, and in a moment, he'd known.

He'd opened the door just in time to see her fall.

Everyone talked about how events like that took so long, like every single frame of the present took a minute to pass before your eyes. It wasn't like that at all, though. That came later, replayed over and over in your mind until it took up all conscious thought. When he'd opened the door, she'd been standing, and then she was on the ground. Spatters of blood splashed to the dust and her body jolted from the fall.

Then it was over. Only later did he see how her hair obscured her eyes, keeping her from seeing his blank, terrified stare as he slipped to his knees. Only later did he realize she'd whispered his name when she'd seen him running. Only later did he see her fear.

Those men...they moved fast, too, just like time. Their guns were raised, allowing him only moments. He drew his own weapon. Their arms...their legs...he'd hit no fatal places. That was all he was sure of.

_No._

God, please, don't let her be gone. Don't let her be gone.

He stumbled to her side. She'd looked up at him with a softness he'd never seen before in those eyes. She gripped the hand he'd offered, but the fingers that entwined with his were weak. He didn't want to look at the two holes that dotted her blouse below her right collarbone. He didn't want to see the blood that had specked around the bullet holes and spread ever so slowly outward. A thin stream of scarlet fell down her cheek as she opened her mouth to speak.

The pain etched into her face seemed not so much physical as mental. The only thing that came from her lips was bubbling scarlet life. She tried to whisper, tried to mouth the words, but her pain kept anything from reaching him.

She died not having said those words, and she died without hearing the ones he softly murmured against her hair. "Meryl...no. Don't go, please. I love you, Meryl. Please. Wake up..."

His voice was monotonous, broken, and unaccented, like a child's. His face was void of everything but shock, and tears streaked down his cheeks from eyes that barely dared to blink. Vash leaned forward, pressing his face to her chest, hoping to hear even a single breath. There was nothing. Her blood streaked his face.

He tried.

He tried so hard to save the bad and good alike. He wondered if he'd ever saved the ones who'd done this to her, and he couldn't stand his thoughts.

He was just one. Despite the power he wielded, despite his will, he was only one among so many.

One who was imperfect. One who failed only to save those who meaned the most.

He was one man who held a hand long gone cold.

"Please...don't go."

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**Author's Notes:** For some reason I kept wondering if it was possible to write stories titled by number. I'm not sure if I'll ever do it, but this story came out of it, so...it was really fun to try! LOL, I was actually going to make a oneshot collection called In Which Everyone Dies, because I've been writing a **lot** of depressing fics, but I decided not to. Yeah...um... ::blinks:: Ah...**Please review? **I'll be lucky if anyone reviews, but I'd appreciate it more than I can say if you'd take a few seconds to leave your thoughts.


	9. Into the Darkness

**Into the Darkness**

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"Oh, look!" Vash said.

They were the first words he'd spoken in a while, and the first ones he'd said with any enthusiasm in an even longer period. Knives looked up from his musings, sighing with relief he didn't let show. "What is it, Vash?"

His easily amused brother smiled a soft smile. "I didn't think about it before, but the suns are twins, aren't they?"

Knives rolled his eyes, glancing cursorily at the bright stars that shone upon this planet. "Yes, I suppose so. Just like us."

Twilight was imminent. The horizon, shuddering with heat haze, seemed to rise up to swallow the two suns in night.

Knives' tongue peeked out of the corner of his mouth in deep concentration as he worked on a project he'd been putting together for the last week. The pieces were scattered around him, each different type organized and placed in its preordained spot. Nice and orderly just as he liked it.

"_Kniiiiiives?_"

He put the project on the sand with patience and looked up. "Yes, Vash."

His brother clasped both small hands together, eyes wide and thoughtful, lips pursed in an expression of innocent curiosity. "If they're like us, which one's you?"

Knives looked up to the blazing sky, his answer monotonous and immediate. "I'm the big one. You're the little one trailing behind."

Vash crossed his arms and plopped down onto the sand wordlessly.

Knives returned to his project. Several silent moments passed.

"Knives?"

He laid it down with a bit less patience this time, but his voice didn't show the change. "What is it?"

"Why do you get to be the bigger one?" Vash's small fingers picked up handfuls of sand and let them drain lazily back to the ground.

"Don't worry about it, Vash," Knives said.

Soon enough, Vash wandered off, fascinated by a slender, black reptile slithering across the sands. Knives did not pick up his project again. He sighed, looking up at the twin suns with a different perspective. He really was like the bigger sun. It was the brightest one, the one that _burned_ this arid planet, where the child sun's light was refreshing and soft. The child sun tagged along behind the other one, its soft light helpless to diffuse the wrath of the larger one. It was the one that made the temperatures bearable before nightfall. It was the second sun that everyone thought of when they thought of restful light.

But as long as the little sun didn't have to become as violent and wrathful as its twin, Knives was sure the big one could bear the blame. The big one would have to, or the little one would be forced to take the burden. The little sun couldn't bear it.

Despite its best intentions, it was the big sun that led its twin into darkness.

There was no way to change the destiny of the paths they took across the sky.

Knives thought of reaching toward his project, but he just didn't feel the motivation anymore. A soft breeze blew across the sands, and as Knives stared into the blinding light of fading day, he felt inexplicably cold.

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**Author's Notes: **It's not a drabble, and yet it's not a oneshot, really. It's...short! I've been thinking about Knives and Vash as kids a lot, I guess, and somehow I ended up equating the suns into it. (nervously laughs) Anyway, little Knives is so fun to write! **Please Review! **Cookies and cute little genocidal Plants for your thoughts? (_innocent grin_)

**Edit: **Gah, I just realized that the site's going nutty! I haven't been able to see updates to stories on the front page, and when I try to visit the chapters, it says they don't exist. Lol, just my bad luck. Is anyone else having this problem?


	10. They All Fall Down

**They All Fall Down**

**Notes:** Okay...this one is **twisted**. In case dark stuff doesn't appeal to anyone, I thought I'd put a note up here so no one would find out too late. I thought it would be interesting to try a story focusing around Legato after so many about Vash. Call me crazy...but Legato's really fun to write!

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In the end, they all fall down, but just for a moment—for even a second—he loves the feeling that he feels right now.

They move around him as he looks down at his hands, not daring to lift his gaze. Is this what family is? Gentle laughter strains to his ears, bringing an eerie smile to his soft, pale lips. His teeth catch the lower lip and chew it thoughtfully, nervously, before letting it go. A hand alights on his shoulder and a voice says, "You'd better hurry up! We're going outside to play!"

He doesn't look at her face but he knows it by heart. Pale hair, doe-brown and chin length, caresses her beautiful face. Angular features are complimented by the smile of kindness that always turns her pink mouth up. The smile runs all the way to her emerald eyes. Her walk is graceful, quick and yet unhurried. Her name is Fawn. She is sixteen. A small boy follows her out the door. Again without looking, the indigo-haired child recalls the young one's face. Blond hair, this time, sticking out in odd places. Buck teeth and a grin that rivals the sun. Brown eyes like chocolate, and a laugh that makes grumpy old men smile. Ethan; six years old.

The parents have the same brown hair, except the man's is straight, thick, and flecked generously with gray while the woman's is still solidly brown, falling in ringlet curls down a long, compassionate face. Their names are Samuel and Eden.

The father walks to join the girl, and for the briefest of moments, he allows his gaze to move enough to see the father's beckoning hand. He can imagine the words. _Son, come join us!_

His breath catches in his throat and the boy falls forward onto his hands, tears dripping from eyes that do not match his mother's or father's, eyes that are the deepest of amber-yellow, animalistic and brimming with sorrow. The tears make silent tracks down his face, but his expression reflects none of his sorrow because he doesn't know how to show it. What he wouldn't give for a warm embrace right now.

That's what family is for.

Fawn walks slowly inside, soft voice cooing whispers of comfort. Her arms wrap around him and he at last does the thing he's been avoiding. He looks up to her expressionless face. All this time, he has expected it, braced himself for it, but he can't help the horrible emptiness that spreads inside him upon looking at her. Those eyes are lightless, blank, and the smile is a forced grimace over her teeth. Her skin, usually pale, is waxy and without warmth. The embrace presses her freezing cold skin to his neck, and he feels sick.

"What's wrong?" he makes the lifeless voice speak.

He blinks and lets more tears fall down his face. Her voice does not soothe him.

Ethan wanders inside, skipping, and Samuel and Eden walk behind him. The yellow-eyed boy looks at them, at the tilted heads and expressionless faces, and he hears dusty words of comfort.

With a sob, he uncrosses his arms and the family drops lifelessly to the ground, falling without care for themselves, because they are dead. He grins maliciously at himself. Malice. This is an emotion he knows, an expression his face can make. He is weak to do this. He's weak to wonder what family is like, what love is like. In life they smile, but that smile stays on their face as they betray. They release their allegiance with honey and kisses.

He knows this. He knows their flaws. Why then, does he still desire the warmth of an embrace?

"I don't need you!" he screams at the corpses. He gets to his feet in a house that is not his own and races from the door.

He doesn't. He doesn't need this love...this warmth...this security. It can end too fast.

Because in the end...they all fall down.

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**Author's Notes:** Want a family? Kill one and control them remotely. Eek. Legato is scary. Or maybe, by association, I'm scary? I sure hope not. (_hugs fluffy teddy bear_) See? I'm all sweetness and light. This is placed at some time in Legato's childhood, and could be either anime or manga-verse, since the origins of his abilities are rather vague in both. Well...anyway...how is it? **Please Review?**


	11. Not as I Do

**Not as I Do**

**Notes: **Because I was thinking that Knives is right. Poor Vash really is one big contradiction in some ways.

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Do as I say, not as I do.

It's a phrase that fits him so well. He says that people shouldn't be alone, and yet the isolation he forces on himself is the most painful sort of loneliness. He says, "Settle down," but has damned himself to a life of wandering. He protects innocence even as his own burns away with his agonized tears.

"Don't cry," he says...but I hear him at night.

To him, suicide is a horrible thing, yet it's _his_ body that takes the bullets for those he tries to protect, his life that is torn away with each passing year. He always says that the ticket to the future is blank. Why, then, does his past control his life?

Forgive, he says, and yet each of his sins is a knife that cuts away at his heart.

I know he smiles...and I know that he does look toward the future, but the pains he forces himself to bear make me want to take them for him and hold them no matter the weight. To work together and to share one's burdens—though that man encourages both, he exercises neither.

"Love and Peace!" he says, but he denies them to himself in order to give them to others.

I love him, yet I hate him for what he's doing to himself. All I can do is watch as he smiles his empty smiles and as the light of life fades from his eyes.

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**Author's Notes:** This is just an introspective drabblish thing that possessed me as I was thinking about Vash. It's told from Meryl's POV (just in case it was confusing, which I hope it wasn't!). As it is my first semi-pseudo-drabble-sort-of-thing ©, I'd _love_ any thoughts. **Please Review? **I'm sorry it was so short! (knocks on brain)


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